Keep writing even if you're the only one that reads it

I'm not really a writer

I'm not someone who actually identifies themselves as a writer. I'm many other things I won't mention for now.

I'm not a published book author and I'm dyslectic. Sometimes I get so frustrated when I want to write simple words, but my brain can't seem to translate the spelling on the page. As I write this it already has many mistakes which I'll correct and read over. The point here is I'm not perfect and no one is but I am someone who writes and enjoys to do so. Well maybe I am a writer after all.

Looking over my life so far, I've always been a writer, I wrote short stories when I was a kid and songs and more when I was a teenager.

New York city an actors hopes and dreams

The time I started paying more attention to my writing was when I was living in New York for a short and long hot summer.

I was attending the Stellar Adller's actor studio, left my boyfriend at the time at home in London and took a flight.

I was running away, not from anyone just from everything I thought was true and no longer was.

I landed in JFK New York, it was my first time in the states. The heat was intense. From the moment I got off the plain it felt more like I had landed in the amazon jungle than the big apple, I guess that's where the saying "concrete jungle" comes from. The heat and energy was palpable, like the humming of eight million buzzing bees.

I had one huge suitcase and backpack and a limited amount of cash.

I was in a really highly unsettling state, anxious, excited, scared, a cocktail of an emotional rollercoaster ice tea.

I had to get to the apartment I was subletting from a friend of a friend of a freind in Astoria, Queens. I had no idea how i'd get there without wifi or data, things I hadn't considered.

It was 2016 but looking back now the tech and wifi was still a bit dated and not so freely accessible. All I knew was Queens was where Eddy Murphy's' character Prince Hakeem, went to in 'Coming to amercica' and that's where I was going too!

I had the address and would just have to find my way the old school way, asking for directions and reading, so archaic.

The journey from JFK to my apartment involved, me taking the subway for first time, getting what seemed like purposefully wrong directions from a hostile paranoid lady clown (possible children's' party entertainer or something more sinister). Me refusing for anyone to help me with my suitcase that weighed like a ton of bricks, in fear I was going to get robbed. And being in awe of famous landmarks and street names I'd only seen in the movies. It was already an adventure to say the least.

I finally found the apartment, after walking serval blocks dragging my heavy load literally and metaphorically and surprise surprise I couldn't get inside. My phone wasn't working, so I had to walk again to find a cafe with wifi to contact my new roomie. I eventually did and finally got into the apartment and it wasn't great. I could go on in great detail here but to be honest I wouldn't like to relive that portion of my adventure.

Let's just say I wasn't expecting the rude wake up call New York had for an another aspiring actress moving to pursue her dreams.

The next day I was at the prestigious Stella Adler conservorty, thrown into the deep end with her famous acting techniques. Everything in New York was like an echo on steroids from London. I wasn't prepared for it but my experience totally matched the state of being I was in at the time, a hot mess!

Part of the actor's training, is observing, noticing and paying attention to life and people. This I did a lot of mostly when travelling on the A train from Harlem to Manhattan after I moved three weeks later from Queens.

I was a nervous wreck a lot of the time, struggling with extreme highs and lows on the emotional spectrum. Some people call it life crisis, spiritual awakening or a medical professional may have called it something quite different.

Note book of dreams

I had earlier purchased, a small yellow, A6 sized note book with a sketch of the winged horse pegasus on the cover. The only thing I could afford in the gift shop near the Hudson river. I was drawn to it, I've always been a fan and avid reader of greek mythology and it was cute.

From the moment I got it I carried it everywhere I went fro the rest of my trip. That's when the magic started. I would write endlessly on the subway anytime I felt overwhelmed, paranoid or anxious. It was healing, cathartic, it was a melody of words on the page. Transforming my fears into short poems and rhymes. I would later read and share on little stages with curious audiences that would interpret their own meaning.

I wrote many other musings following my homecoming to London. Scripts, songs, stories, some that only me and page know, others shared in my personal blogs or became short films.

I'm glad to say now, I'm in a happy, healthy place mentally even with life's ups and downs and writing has been and still is one of the tools that has helped me get here. So keep writing too, even if it's just for you. Who knows someone else might read it and it could be just the thing they needed to keep going too.